Primordial Expanse: I have the Strongest Talent!-Chapter 631: Traitor

Alex almost wanted to refute himself, but he knew that was most likely the truth.

Mira’s Call of the Void talent was her ultimate escape route should anything ever happen to put her in grave danger. It was obvious from the state of the entire Star System that this was most likely the case.

Alex turned to look at Althea, wondering if she had any insights of her own.

...Her face was ashen. Maybe she didn’t know as much as Alex about the Void realm, but she clearly knew enough to know it wasn’t to be trifled with.

Even for an S tier like her, it was an incredibly dangerous place.

So far, only Farnes had taken the risk of going there, and that was just to fetch Mira back after she made the mistake of entering the first time round.

However, considering the Void dimension was a mirror of the outside world, Mira should be able to see everything that was going on in this Star System for herself. Though she might not know of Alex’s or Althea’s arrival, as she was still far too weak to scan the whole system with her Spatial Perception like Alex could.

Alex briefly considered calling Farnes and asking him how he managed to access the Void previously, but threw those thoughts out.

Time was of the essence, and he needed to find her previous location before it was too late.

"She can only stay in the Void for an hour at a time before she’s forced out! We need to be quick." Alex sent a mental message over to Althea who floated in space just a few metres away from him.

"How are we supposed to do that? For all we know she could have entered from anywhere in this system." Althea was just as stressed.

She had only just recently reconnected with her daughter after years of time apart. Being separated once again like this felt like her heart was getting torn to pieces.

"Aren’t you the S tier? Can’t you just show your face in the midst of this battle and scare everyone into submission?" Alex sent a condescending glance over at her.

Ever since she questioned his actions after how much he’d sacrificed for humanity, his opinion of her had fallen.

But his words did give her an idea.

"We may not be able to find her last location in time, but we can do the next best thing." Althea’s brows furrowed after hearing Alex’s obvious disrespect, but the days of where she could do something about it were far behind her at this point.

"Go on." Alex urged her to continue.

"We can just eliminate every threat in this system that is capable of harming her. That way, even when she does show up, she won’t be in any immediate danger and you can locate her right away."

Alex’s eyes glinted at that suggestion.

For once, Althea had said something useful.

Without another word, he expanded his Spatial Perception to the absolute limit. The chaotic battlefield of the Bugonia Star System unfolded inside his mind like a scattered web of intersecting lines.

Burning fragments of warships drifted through open space. Ruined stations spun slowly, bleeding atmosphere and fire out into the vacuum. Several shattered moons, fractured asteroids, scattered corpses... there was nowhere left in this system that wasn’t ravaged by death and destruction.

And he was yet to figure out what even started it. 𝐟𝗿𝐞𝚎𝚠𝐞𝚋𝕟𝐨𝚟𝐞𝕝.𝕔𝕠𝚖

Beneath all of it, one cold truth remained, though.

’This is going to be difficult... even for me.’

There were too many threats.

Far too many.

It wouldn’t be wrong to say that this place might even be the centre of the conflict between all the races for dominance over Andromeda.

"We’re in for a shit show! I can sense 15 S tier presences in this system alone and thousands of A tiers. My gut tells me that Mira’s disappearance has something to do with one or multiple of these S tiers."

Though, he was curious to know where all of these powerhouses had suddenly come from.

How could this star system have developed to this level of chaos in such a short amount of time. Barely a few minutes had passed since his call with Mira was disconnected and his arrival at the Bugonia system, yet all these people had shown up.

’From how relaxed and calm Mira appeared on her side, it’s clear she had no idea of the chaos either. And I doubt she would be so unaware of what was going on in her own backyard. So all of this must have occurred spontaneously within the time the explosions rang out in her ship, and my arrival.’

And there was only one conclusion that made sense, one that, if true, could spell a disaster for the Federation.

’...All these people were here already, waiting for the perfect moment to strike.’

The fact that none of the Federation’s sensors were able to detect them meant the worst as well.

’A mole.’

The only possible way something like that could have occurred was a betrayal. And not one on a low level as well. One at the highest.

That’s when something rung in his mind. It’s like a bell tolled, bringing back a faint memory, a name, that he had almost completely forgotten about at that moment.

"Donald..." he muttered.

"What was that?" Althea spoke up, briefly confused by Alex’s sudden utterance of the name.

However, Alex continued ruminating on his own thoughts to himself.

’I knew something was fishy about him from the first moment he contacted me all the way back over in Telorn. Only now did it click! He’s been a traitor all along!’

’That fucker... First he sells us out to the Red Demons, and when that plan goes awry with their extinction, he goes and finds a new master to serve. Who could it be this time? The Lux? Or one of these other races? But these guys don’t seem as accommodating as the Red Demons were. They’d likely kill him on sight before he had the chance to explain himself.’

"What did you just say?" Althea looked gravely at Alex, as if he spoke of the devil in front of a devout believer.

"Huh? You know of Donald?" He asked, surprised by her response.

He didn’t mean to speak his name; that was just him thinking aloud.

But perhaps there was more to the story than the side he knew...